Russia’s e-commerce business has grown exponentially in recent years. Increasing number of consumers is now eager to make online jewellery purchases. According to Oborot website, the jewellery e-commerce industry in Russia is expected to rise sharply from merely one percent in 2012 to around 10 percent of total market share by 2016. Andrey Yanchevskiy and Vladimr Orlov, founders of a Russian online jeweller GOLD4U, shared with Hong Kong Jewellery an overview of jewellery e-commerce business in the market.
According to Yanchevskiy, GOLD4U was established in 2005, competing against only three online players. At that time, jewellery e-commerce industry was just in its infancy in Russia. Today, over 200 online jewellers have gained a foothold in Russia, offering consumers a wide range of jewellery.
Russia is a country with a vast territory. However, online shoppers are mostly located at Moscow. Orlov explained: “Compared with other regions in Russia, Moscow has a more developed internet culture and is much more convenient. For example, customers in Moscow will usually receive their jewellery on the same day or next day after placing orders in GOLD4U. On the other hand, residents in remote areas have not developed an internet culture. The delivery time is not reliable due to complicated geographical condition. All these factors result in a relatively high purchasing cost to the consumers.”
In addition, the general consumers are more reluctant to make online payment compared with other countries. Orlov describes such consumer behaviour as ‘Internet ordering’. He said: “We seldom see credit card payment in Russia. Online shoppers prefer to pay in cash at the time they receive the products. Even if they accept credit card payment, they still insist to pay after receiving goods. The main problem is that they are not happy to receive nothing after payment. Some are even afraid that their products would be lost on the way of delivery.” However, he emphasised that the use of online payment is steadily increasing nowadays.
Yanchevskiy shared his view on the clientele of online jewellery market in Russia. As the average marriage age is about 25 years old in Russia, GOLD4U mainly sells engagement and wedding jewellery to around 25- to 30-year-old customers currently. The website’s statistics show that around 65 percent of customers are men while female occupies the remaining proportion. He joked: “Our figures show that customers who always browse our website are ladies, but most transactions are done by men. It implies that men mainly do the ordering while the decision-makers are actually ladies.” Each transaction will incur averagely about US$500, which is far more than transaction of US$150 in physical stores.
In Russia, online jewellers usually implement both online and offline promotion strategies, in order to seek a wider customer base. Yanchevskiy pointed that social media and email are GOLD4U’s promotion channels. He continued: “The common social media in Russia include VK, Facebook and Odnoklassniki; and the web search engine is Yandex.”
Besides internet, Yanchevskiy also stated that Russian consumers are becoming more active in m-commerce now. A mobile application for GOLD4U was therefore developed to facilitate customers in searching their favourite jewellery. However, he frankly said: “Internet is still more popular. Customers usually purchase jewellery with purposes, for example, anniversary. Thus, we seldom see people browsing products by phone on bus or street for filling up their leisure time.”
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